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Monday, 11 November 2013

The Dismal Economist

Alphen, Netherlands. 11
November.On this day of remembrance
when a few miles from here many tens of thousands perished in the 1914-1918 war
thoughts of country are particularly poignant, except that is for the few who
regard ‘country’ as an anachronism.On
25 October The Economist’s Daniel
Knowles appeared on the BBC’s flagship political programme, The Daily Politics to argue that
northern England cities be allowed to die.Thankfully veteran Labour politician John Prescott was on hand to shred
him. Sadly, Mr Knowles typified
everything that is now wrong with a once great newspaper; a detached from
reality, ivory tower, elite other-worldliness in which analysis has been
replaced with dogma verging on propaganda.

Take propaganda.This week The
Economist suggested that if Scotland left the UK; “At a stroke, the kingdom
would become one third smaller. Its influence in the world…greatly
reduced”.This is Scottish elite hubris.Scotland might comprise 30% of Britain’s
landmass but it has only 9% of the population, and whilst more than 60% of its
economy is dependent on the British state its 2012 GDP at $216bn was less than 10%
of Britain’s.

The
Economist’s retreat from the real world of real
people has been on-going for some time.This
week Joel Budd argues for Britain to stay in the EU and to open its doors to
unfettered immigration.That saddest
thing about the piece is the use of blatant scaremongering and insults to cull
proper debate.Those of us with
legitimate concerns about power, democracy and governance in the EU and the undoubted
social and cultural impact of rapid hyper-immigration are accused of being
“Little Englanders”.Instead the entire
piece relies on a series of prejudices that in the past would never have made
it past the reality test for which The
Economist was once renowned.

The
Economist also states, “Continental Europeans are coming
around to the long-held British view that the EU should be smaller, less
bureaucratic and lighter on business”.If
that were true and the EU could be pulled back from its super-state fantasy and
replaced with a deeper single market that preserved state independence then it
would have my full support.However,
living in Continental Europe and from my travels around Europe and to Brussels
I see no evidence of elite Europeans “coming around” to the British way of
thinking.Quite the reverse.

Rather, I see a
German-led Europe that in a desperate bid to save the single currency will soon
launch a fresh wave of political integration.Far from The Economist’s idea
of a less regulated, more open Europe Europeans are about to be engulfed by a
new wave of regulation.This is because
European integration IS regulation.Indeed,
for The Economist’s view to prevail
the EU’s entire political culture would have to move decisively away from its
statist origins and that is not going to happen.

However, it is
immigration where The Economist
reveals itself most unworldly.Whilst I
agree that Britain should always be open to the world’s talented the entire
point about the EU is that Britain should only be open to Europe – both the
talented and the not-so-talented.Indeed,
the essential point The Economist
misses is that for the EU Britain can either be open to the world or the EU but
not both.Essentially, the EU remains a
protectionist block designed to enable Germans to sell things to a closed
market and prevent the excesses of globalisation ‘damaging’ what many European see
as their cultural and social patrimony.

Last week The Economist even suggested that EU hyper-immigration
was a good thing because “Britain gains from their skills without having to
invest in schools”.What about the one
million unemployed British youth?What
such nonsense reveals is that for The
Economist Britain’s social and cultural identity count for nothing.Rather, any level of immigration should be
allowed irrespective of the impact on national identity and social cohesion if
it adds an extra quarter percentage point on GDP.

The essential problem is
that The Economist today combines two
truly dismal perspectives.First, the
paper is a true scion of the ‘dismal science’ of economics which reduces everything
to mammon and thus so often misses the very things that make society and strategy tick.Second, The
Economist has become locked into a London liberal elite bubble which sneers
at the very idea of national identity and the loyalty which is today celebrated
and commemorated. The paper even goes as far as
to call on Britain to “abandon its separatist dreams” as though the world’s 5th
or 6th largest economy and 4th defence spender was already
a mere province of the EU super-state.

The
Economist is championing an essential nonsense; that Britain
can stay in the EU and be open to the world.

I am a proud Briton and
a proud, thinking European.The Economist?I wonder… Expect more of this propaganda.

About Me

Julian Lindley-French is Senior Fellow of the Institute of Statecraft, Director of Europa Analytica & Distinguished Visiting Research Fellow, National Defense University, Washington DC. An internationally-recognised strategic analyst, advisor and author he was formerly Eisenhower Professor of Defence Strategy at the Netherlands Defence Academy,and Special Professor of Strategic Studies at the University of Leiden. He is a Fellow of Respublica in London, and a member of the Strategic Advisory Group of the Atlantic Council of the United States in Washington.
Latest books: The Oxford Handbook on War 2014 (Paperback) (2014; 709 pages). (Oxford: Oxford University Press) & "Little Britain? Twenty-First Strategy for a Middling European Power". (www.amazon.com)
The Friendly-Clinch Health Warning: The views contained herein are entirely my own and do not necessarily reflect those of any institution.